Educating teachers in Bangladesh: Current issues and future perspectives

Teacher education plays a very significance role in developing the total education system.  With the increase in sources of information and the rapid access to information teachers have to cope with the current world both for themselves and their students. The proper implementation of the national education policy largely depends on the effective use of teacher education. Its main focus is to deliver quality teaching in the classroom. Through proper training a teacher  could be  able to know how to present lesson in the class, how to make the lesson more interesting to the learners and how to make the best use of time in the class engaging the learners in active participation. At present there are 14 Teachers' Training Colleges, 5 Higher Secondary Teachers' Training Institutes (HSTTIs) and National Academy for Educational Management (NAEM) that have been working for the development of teacher education. Besides these, a large number of private teachers' training colleges and some private universities are providing one-year B Ed degree on 'Teacher Education'. It is mentionable that B Ed courses both under National University and Bangladesh Open University are the same. Both universities follow the same curriculum. Under National University for B Ed course, a trainee has to attend classes 6 days in a week. S/he has to sit for two semester internal exam and one final exam and two-phase 'Teaching Practices' at school 6 weeks in each phase. Besides this, a trainee has to write many assignments and at least 90 lesson plans on two teaching subjects. On the other hand, in Bangladesh Open University a trainee has to attend class one day in a week especially on Friday, and this one day class is not taken as obligatory. Other issues like teaching practices at schools is not controlled strictly. So what a variation! B Ed under Bangladesh Open University should be at least for three years whereas students are getting degree within a year. This is the main cause of death of government teachers' training colleges. The policymakers should consider the issue before passing the order and this is time for reconsidering the issue. What role did the principals of Teachers' Training Colleges play that time? A so-called certificate bearing teacher can never provide better teaching. Similarly government especially Ministry of Education should strictly controll the private B Ed colleges and certificate selling universities. Our secondary education is facing a lot of challenges. I believe present government is committed and trying for quality education. But how is it possible to ensure quality? An unqualified teacher can never ensure quality education. I think government should take control of the challenges strictly.
At present Government Teachers' Training Colleges are facing challenging situation as most students/trainees are attending to Private Teachers' Training Colleges/Universities for easy availability of 'degree' rather than quality. Introducing one year B Ed under the supervision the Bangladesh Open University is another obstacle to ensuring the quality of teacher education. Teachers getting degree from the institutions mentioned above are creating negative impact on the quality of education. Therefore, to ensure the quality of secondary education the authority/government should ensure accountability, monitoring and transparency in their activities for building better future for the coming generation.
 Quality education is the vision of the present government. The education policy-2010 also emphasizes upgrading the standard of education. In this respect some development projects have been working in the field of secondary education. The government has recently taken a number of initiatives to ensure the quality of education and to bring some positive changes in the assessment system. Teaching Quality Improvement (TQI_SEP, MoE), a development organization, has been working since 2005, to improve the quality of secondary education. The organization has been developing training programmes for subject based teachers, head teachers, educational administrators both in Bangladesh and abroad. TQI has managed to develop subject based training modules for the teachers. It has also developed a curriculum and syllabus for the one-year B Ed training programme under the National University.
A number of projects such as 'English Language Teaching Improvement Project' (ELTIP), English in Action (EiA), Access to Information (A2I), English for Teaching, Teaching for English (ETTE), Secondary Education Quality and Access Enhancement Project (SEQAEP) have been organizing language teacher training to improve the teaching and learning in Bangladeshi schools. To train teachers as an on-going process the government needs to develop permanent infrastructure and institutional capacity.
To develop national capacity for sustainable teacher training, the Bangladesh government can utilise the potential of education of public universities with their expertise and infrastructure. By providing financial incentives, the government of Bangladesh, developing nations and donor agencies can encourage local experts, academics and language educators from local universities/colleges to work with primary and secondary schools.
In order to meet the current and future needs and challenges of the socio-economic developments of the country, the education system of Bangladesh is continually undergoing reforms. Despite all remarkable achievements, high rates of failure in the public examinations and the increased dropout of students from the schools reflect the declining quality in secondary education system. The Bangladesh government should recognize the needs on a priority basis to improve the quality of education alongside its efforts for creating equitable access to secondary education. Though the government has limitations, yet more investment in this sector is needed if development of education is to face the challenges of the time.
To introduce the new trends in teaching, regular professional development courses could be conducted for teachers and opportunities for training for teachers   should, if at all possible, be extended. Some development projects have organized training programmes for short periods (2-3 weeks). Short training courses of three and six months duration could also be run for teachers currently. Teachers complete the training and return to the schools but very few teachers appear to implement new strategies and understanding as there is no monitoring system from the education authority.
Therefore it is the time for policymakers to analyze the ways and means of implementing effective and cost-efficient professional development training for developing national capacity for sustainable teacher training and to achieve these goals. Resource materials are the essential components for effective classroom teaching. For developing the students' motivation and to engage them in the activities and to make the classroom more lively teachers need to use teaching aids frequently. However, the classrooms in the secondary schools in Bangladesh in most cases are not well equipped with resources/teaching materials. Because of financial constraints of the governments/institutes, the authority/teachers cannot provide/manage these materials. As a result, teachers are sometimes limited in providing effective learning opportunities.
Therefore to ensure quality in teaching more support from the part of the government and private sectors are immediately needed. A teacher has to take much preparation before going to the class. He/she has to collect lot of supporting materials to make the class more effective. My experience working as a teacher trainer with secondary school teachers noticed that many teachers are found to attend training after working fifteen to twenty years and even more time of their teaching career. These teachers mentioned that if they were provided training in their early teaching career they could provide better teaching. My ideas and experiences say like military training each and every teacher should be taken compulsory subject based training at least for three months from the very entry level of their teaching career. I believe to ensure the quality of teaching the government should pay more attention on teacher education, teacher training, and recruitment policy, should create better opportunities for teachers, ensure more physical support in the institutions and should give priority on teachers' teaching quality, research and publications for their promotion to make the teaching competitive and finally should set some standard for the private Teachers' Training  Colleges/universities  to ensure quality in education.

The writer is an Associate Professor of English, DSHE, MoE & PhD Research Fellow at Department of English, Jahangirnagar University. E-Mail: [email protected]